Written by Scott Robinson

Scott Robinson is an Associate Editor of VoegelinView, Assistant Professor of Government and Assistant Director of the Center for Law and Liberty at Houston Baptist University. He is currently working on a book on John Locke’s political rhetoric and its long-term impact on American political thought.

An ongoing debate in American political science regards the dispositions of the factions within American society towards one another; some scholars argue that a culture war obtains, while others point towards the peaceful transitions of power and the respect for political opposition in America as hallmarks of an exemplary civil society.[1] Eric Voegelin analyzed the cultural factors which affect the…

Eric Voegelin’s 1956 essay “Necessary Moral Bases for Communication in a Democracy” is of tremendous worth to the careful analyst of 21st century American political thought. It sheds much light on the effect that communication styles may have on the character of a society, and it sheds further light on the true but concealed nature of pluralistic societies. Characterizations of…

IntroductionThe American debate regarding the policy needed to combat the dangers posed by immigration from nations who are currently hotbeds of Islamic radicalization is presently being vociferously fought. This debate recently culminated with an Executive Order by President Trump that suspended travel from seven such nations to improve vetting measures. Six of the nations included in the Order are amongst…

John Locke took the concept of rebellion which had a rich history in political philosophy and deftly assigned to it a new meaning that was useful for his political theory. But Locke failed to fully disclose the transformative nature of his conception of rebellion. Instead, he attempted to make his idea of rebellion appear to be consistent with traditional thought.…